


A morning of mourning

by Gavranica



Category: Maleficent (Disney Movies)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Original Character Death(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-02
Updated: 2020-08-09
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:02:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,698
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25669390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gavranica/pseuds/Gavranica
Summary: Diaval acts strange. Maleficent questions him and crosses a line.
Comments: 12
Kudos: 49





	1. Chapter 1

When Diaval started having the prolonged periods of absentminded silence, accompanied by staring somewhere in the distance, Maleficent started to suspect something might be off with him. But she didn't pry, just decided to keep a closer eye on the raven.

Weeks passed, and his strange behavior continued.

When she started to get the feeling he couldn't leave her side fast enough when all the jobs for the day were done, it felt like the times when the beastie was very small. Then, too, he was spending all his free time around the child, and Maleficent remembered the jealousy she still barely admitted to herself, and she was adamantly certain she would never admit to him. Oh, how it would get to his head, if he found out! Unimaginable.

But this time it couldn't be the girl, because these days Maleficent was skulking around the cottage as much as him, and she would know if he was spending his free time, as little as he had, with the child.

But when one day she was the one to remind him off-handedly that the beastie was about to celebrate her fourteenth birthday in only several days, his eyes widened in sheer panic, and his hackles rose as if threatened, and Maleficent knew he had _forgotten Aurora's birthday_ , which was unheard of in thirteen and a half years. Every year, the "pretty bird" would show up on the child's birthday, bringing carefully selected assortment of flowers, nuts, shiny river stones and occasional rodent clean-picked skeleton (not a tiniest bone was disturbed. Only the best for the little beast). 

Now, Maleficent watched him pace the clearing and cussing at himself. He rarely cussed, but when he did, he had a very enlightening repertoire. She'd never known _that_ particular body part to be mentioned in a same sentence with the act of reproduction. But it lasted for quite some time, and his odd behavior was making her anxious, and her patience was growing short.

"Turn me back", he flailed his hands in mortification. "I have so little time - I cannot just pick any old flower that - perhaps in one of my caches I have -..."

"I have to ask", Maleficent cut him off, thoroughly fed up, "what has gotten into you lately?"

"What?" he snapped out with uncharacteristic lack of patience. He run a desperate hand through his black hair, feathers sticking out in all impossible angles. He usually kept it well groomed, equally prideful in his shiny plumage as both bird and man, but now he made no attempt to smoothen it. "Mistress, into a bird, please! I'm in a hurry, can't you see?" 

He pinned her with that raw, wide-eyed look that touched her soul every time with reminder of innocence, and goodness, and warmth, and pretty much all the things she would never have again in her miserable existence. Just like every time, her soul responded with desperate need to reach out, to open, to touch his soul back. And just like every time, her mind bolted, and she responded with a sneer: "Do I need to remind you who does the other one's bidding between us two, Diaval?"

"Mistress, my apologies, but I really need to - "

"Silence!" She rose her voice, letting some of her anxiety show as rage. Green flickered on her fingertips. "You are going to tell me what is going on in that bird brain of yours, or you will spend the child's birthday trapped under a rock as a slug!" 

That silenced him. But she didn't like how the look in his eyes changed. The open, unguarded window to his soul curtained, and she was looking not into the soft, kind eyes of her 

_(not friend, not friend)_

servant, but into the unfathomable expression of a bird. It was as if he was stepping away from her backwards into some foggy unknown place, and she was left there, standing stupidly into his empty shell. She thought of sand, slipping silently out of the fingers that clenched too tight.

Neither spoke for several long, disturbing moments. He was still as a stone. 

"You have been acting strange for quite some time", she forced herself to speak quietly. She attempted to sound calm and collected, but even to her own ears, her voice sounded icy and threatening. His empty stare inexplicably horrified her, and she was furious at herself because of that. "I need to know what is going on with you. I cannot have you out of your wits. I need to know if I can count on you." 

"Nothing of any singnificance to you is going on, mistress", he whispered. 

His eyes clouded even more, and feeling him slipping away further from her, her hand lashed out like a serpent and caught his chin, yanking his head upwards, her talons almost breaking the skin. 

"I cannot stand liars", she hissed, barely audible. "Can I still trust you, Diaval? Think well. It would be very unwise to make me doubt your loyalty."

If only he showed any trace of fear. If only he flinched, recoiled, yelled, cried, shove her hand away. 

But he just continued to stare at her with those hollow eyes that were almost unrecognizeable withouth their usual, seemingly inexhaustible warmth. If any emotion flickered there, it was a trace of contempt, and she felt chilled to the bone.

"I am always loyal", he said quietly.

"Then talk."

"Why can't you just take my word and trust me when I say that nothing of any importance is going on? Have I ever, in all these years, been anything other than devoted to you? Have I not earned at least a little bit of your trust? Have I ever given you a reason to doubt me?"

"Not until now."

She was still pincering his chin, although a little bit less forcefully. He took a moment before speaking again.

"All this time, all my life given to you, all my care and devotion all of everything that I am - and yet, the first thing that comes to your mind at the first sign that I am not myself is that I might betray you."

She let go of his face, because in those bottomless eyes there was suddenly something stirring alive and it was grief, and it was bitter disappointment, and she pulled back as if scorched.

She found herself speechless. 

She felt like she was holding a very delicate cup of finest crystal in her rough, taloned hands, and the cursed thing was cracking all around, and if she did as much as breathe, it would come apart in a painful mess of sharp splinters.

"Give me back my feathers", he breathed, eyes dark and wounded and cold and horrible.

 _My wings_ , she knew he really meant. 

Without a word, she changed him and he flew up, above the treetops and away from her, uncharacteristically soundless until he made some distance, and only then she heard a hoarse, hollow _"cr-oooar_ ", over and over again, very different from his usual cawing call, and she wondered if it meant weeping in raven. 

The pent-up fear suddenly reached the point of breaking. She became acutely aware of the numerous fairy folk around her, hiding in the trees and the grass, suddenly being awfully still and unnoticeable as possible. Not a fly could be heard, let alone a pixie.

With a forceful strike of her staff to the ground and a blood-curdling roar from her throat, the green magic exploded around her, sending everything alive around her blown away as if hit by a hurricane. Half a mile away, Balthasar needed to root himself firmly to the ground, or else he would stumble. All kinds of small creatures yelled in fear and pain as they were forcefully scatteted away along with the debris, leaves and dust.

When the dust settled along with her racketed nerves, Maleficent sat herself on the ground, in the eye of her destruction perimeter, and spent some time breathing heavily and healing anything that she had just destroyed.

After that ordeal was done, she rose to her feet, leaning heavily on her staff. She hadn't felt that unsteady, pain-ridden and disoriented since she'd lost her first pair of wings.

Her jaw clenched in determination, she searched within herself a network of magical bonds that connected her to Diaval. It could't tell her his precise whereabouts, but it did give her a pull in his general direction. 

She walked for hours. The Moorfolk scattered away wherever she would tread.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Maleficent makes a discovery and has a hard time processing it.

She wasn't surprised to find him fluttering about a small alcove in a rocky slide at the riverbank, trying to accomodate something that looked like several big hazelnuts. A little cache to hide chosen treasures for Aurora.

Maleficent watched him, hidden in the dense foliage and with a little bit of concealing magic. His actions were oddly comforting. Of course he would firstly take care of Aurora's birthday gift. It was familiar. It was so much like him. It was soothing to her. 

When he secured the nuts, he landed at the river bank to drink, and then he was in the air again, headed north. She shadowed after him, much more slowly.

The sun was setting when his trail led her out of the Moors, through the thorn wall, and right there on the other side, she saw him perched on a branch of a large birch. She could see him from the Moor side of the wall, so she did not cross it; she stood still among the thorns and observed him fussing about something. His feathers were ruffled and he clucked at something with some kind of urgency. 

It was when another squak was heard that Maleficent realized he was not alone on that birch.

The other raven looked horribly. Its feathers were of dull, dusty, almost brown color, with occasional grey on the chest, and many were missing. It was moving in a slow, shaky manner when it turned its head towards Diaval and clicked its beak at him. The bird was, Maleficent could tell, very ill, and very old. It was also almost certainly a female.

With her fairy sharp vision, she observed as Diaval approached the ill bird with caution, carrying a big grasshopper in his beak. The female let out a weak, but determined squak. He offered the grasshopper, but rather than taking the offering, she snapped her beak at him irritably. He put the insect down, holding it with his talons, and let out an exasperated, desperate, high-pitched " _carrrrrr_ " and lowered his head before her, submission in every move of his body, his wings all but dropping miserably at his sides.

Without a particular reason, Maleficent found herself resenting the diseased wretch of a bird, profoundly.

The female allowed Diaval to gently nudge at her neck. As he did that, another feather fell of her. He tried to preen her, but it seemed that her plumage, or whatever was left of it, barely stuck to her skin, and when a few more feathers detached and were sent spiraling slowly towards the ground, he stopped and settled for careful, concerned nudging of her face with the tip of his beak. 

Maleficent felt a peculiar tightening in her chest. Her ribcage suddenly felt too small. She was unsure if she was touched, disgusted, worried or jealous. A little bit of everything, likely.

Diaval offered the grasshopper again, and this time, his sickly companion accepted, though with a vary un-ravenlike lack of enthusiasm. But she barely started to slide it down her gullet when her head lurched forward in a distinctive gagging motion and she expelled it right out. She heaved out a horrible hissing sound, feathers puffing up with a shiver, and she gaped with her beak wide open, ragged wings spread out. 

Diaval, even in his bird form, carried the unmistakeable air of someone completely and utterly defeated. 

Maleficent's chest felt even tighter. She noted the numerous watery, bright green droppings the tree underneath the sick bird was soiled with, and plenty of semi-digested, dried traces of stomach contests on the tree and on the ground below. On that whole dirty mess, numerous feathers were sticking to.

The old bird was dying, slowly and painfully. It would certainly be dead already if Diaval wasn't looking after her. Obviously she was ancient for a raven, and her time has come as it was only naturally, but it was heartbeaking nevertheless, seeing him so caring and upset and loving around her.

When the female's heaving subsided, Diaval approached her and nibbled on her beak. Reluctantly, after a while, she opened up, and he carefully regurgitated a tiny bit of his gullet contents in her throat. This she seemed to tolerate, but when he attempted to feed her again, she turned away and buried her small head in the remnants of her shoulder feathers. The display was both poignant and disgusting.

In the falling dusk, Maleficent saw him cleaning the small nest, throwing out some of the accumulated filth, and then settling for the night next to his companion, rather than flying back to his nest in the Moors next to Maleficent's abode.

Suddenly she felt like an intruder, which she knew she was. 

She waited for both birds to fall into slubmer before gently blowing some of her healing magic to the dying raven in a shape of golden dust that fell to the bird's decrepit form, glittering shortly before fading out. It won't actually heal her; there was no power that Maleficent knew of which could heal a body this ill, but it will take any pain away. 

Then, Maleficent backed away, soundlessly, and turned to slowly take a long walk home, letting her flawless night vision to guide her. Her legs felt heavy, and she was tired and she felt strangely disconnected an inexplicably sad.

So, he had found a mate. That was new. And he never told her. And now the mate was dying and of course he was out of his wits.

But why would he choose a female so old? Maleficent guessed she was healthy when he first encountered her, but now her age caught up with her. How long has he been with her? Months? Weeks? Certainly he would be better off with a mate of his own...

His own age. 

Of course. It made sense. Diaval was about her own age, more or less, and they were together probably from before Maleficent met him, or perhaps some time later. Maybe even years later. Still, he was preserved by Maleficent's magic, while his mate...wasn't. Fourteen years, ten years, even five years - all that was a long time for a raven. 

Have they had nestlings? She couldn't imagine Diaval having children of his own and not boasting about it, not sharing it with her, not complaining or asking for free time to help his mate feed them. But again, she couldn't have imagined him having a mate and keeping it a secret, yet here they were, on the opposite sides of the thorn wall, with him desperate with his dying mate, and her alone and miserable and feeling betrayed, even though her rational mind was telling her that Diaval was by no means obliged to inform her of his family matters.

Why didn't he ask for Maleficent's help in treating the sick one? Maleficent couldn't turn back the clock for her, but she could have made her suffer less. Did the stubborn idiot really prefer his mate to die a slow and painful death to revealing her existence to his mistress? She couldn't possibly imagine it. It was so out of character for him, so strikingly different than anything her Diaval would do, that she didn't believe her own judgement anymore. 

_Well, don't you remember what you told him just today,_ a nasty little voice whispered in the back of her mind. _Don't you remember how you threatened him because of his supposed slipping loyalty? Perhaps the poor bird was simply too frightened. Perhaps he thought that having a mate would qualify as betrayal in your eyes, and he feared your wrath. Perhaps even feared for his mate._

It felt like a punch to the gut. 

Certainly Diaval knew her better than that. Everybody else... not so much. Yes, they all thought her to be the Mistress of Evil, and that's how she preferred it. Her old friends had long abandoned her when she had sunk to the bottom. Even Robin. The Tree sentries were loyal, but they were not privy to her soul. But Diaval was different. He was her constant companion, her conscience, her voice of reason, and hasn't shown fear from her in years. Certainly he knew she would never...

... _curse an innocent? Break up a family? Alienate friends? Lash out in fury, destroying everything around you until there is nothing to destroy any more?_

Damn it.


	3. Chapter 3

Aurora's birthday came, and Maleficent hadn't called for Diaval, not once. Neither did he come by himself, as was his habit when she stayed silent for too long.

She walked to Aurora's cottage with a feeling of cold dread in her gut, and hated him for that. Hated herself more. When did she become so...attached to him? How did that happen, and why hadn't she seen it coming? She thought she had been guarding her heart so well.

Hiding among the trees, she watched the life before her unfold, while she stayed unnoticed, invisible, as always. She watched as a weary winged Diaval made appearance, carrying a bundle of small treasures, and in his beak a single perfect iris from the riverbank. The bundle was held in his talons with a desperate grip, secured with a silk handkerchief he must have stolen from Stefan's castle. Maleficent was both awkwardly proud and dismayed seeing that he found a way to wrap the gift and bring it here in his bird form. The lack of fingers did not stop him. Of course it didn't.

Aurora charged out of the cottage at his first " _cro-aaawww"_ ; those three overgrown gnats were obviously still asleep. 

"Oh my pretty, pretty bird, you never forget!" Her face all sunshine and sheer joy, the girl cried with glee as the raven deposited his gift in her expecting hands, and she accepted the flower with a lovely little curtsey, grinning from ear to ear. She scratched the raven's neck gently, and he leaned in her touch, purring and closing his eyes. 

"I was worried you wouldn't come; where were you these days? Did something happen? Oh, pretty bird, you are thinner than ever - are you hungry?" 

Her brow frowned with uncharacteristic worry. "Are you ill? If you are not feeling well, I'll go through my aunties' healing herbs. They have all kinds of teas, just let me know where it hurts. You didn't eat too much rotten old carrion, did you? I know ravens can eat pretty much everything, but you are such a special bird, I wouldn't be surprised if you were special about that, too. I would really prefer you to eat dead things as soon as they are dead. Not when they go spoiled."

Listening closely, Maleficent clenched her jaws. It didn't even occur to her that Diaval might have catched whatever disease his mate had. Of course, all the little beast needed was to take one look at him, and she suspected it without having a clue about his recent whereabouts. Maleficent had known everything, and yet, the thought never crossed her mind.

 _Perhaps because you are a sefish, self-centered arse who only sees her own needs and pains, and is blind for everyone else's?_ The irritating voice in the back of her mind answered. She swatted it away like a pestering fly.

Diaval clicked his beak and shook his head. Aurora looked him carefully in the eye and picked him up in her hands: "Aw, pretty bird, you are not ill; you are _sad_." 

With that, she pulled him into her lap and into a gentle embrace. He leaned in, his blackness melting into her goldenness. 

"If only you could talk and tell me what troubles you", Aurora kissed the top of his head and smoothed the ruffled feathers. He purred, a sad but strangely peaceful sound, and closed his eyes while she scratched his neck.

Maleficent felt her throat tighten. Again, she felt like an impostor, invisible though she was, in a life where she didn't belong. And she was bitterly jealous, of both of them. She was jealous of him, to have that kind of undivided, loving attention from that pure little soul of a child. She was jealous of her, to be able to feel so freely, to have him so close and be unafraid, to have him out of his own free will and not out of duty, to have him at all, all that beauty and goodness of his soul. She wanted to come over there, to step into their sunlight and soak the warmth in. 

Instead, she stepped a bit further away in her shadows.

Diaval stirred, then jumped on Aurora's shoulder, then snatched a hairpin out of her glittering locks and fluttered just out of her reach. Her whole demeanor changed in an instant.

"Oh! You thief!" She laughed impishly. "I'll get you, I will!" 

And with that, begun a game of tag that led them out of the earshot of Aurora's oblivious (and, obviously, asleep) guardians, and into the woods. The raven would drop the hairpin and snatched it away mid-air just before Aurora would be able to grab it, to the girl's absolute delight. Soon, he just so happened to be inexplicably too slow to catch it before Aurora did, and now she was the pursued one. The forest rang with her laughter.

When time came for Aurora to return home, announced by Knotgrass' irritated (and slightly worried) call, Diaval nibbled at her hair affectionally and she stroke his beak. "Hope to see you soon, pretty bird. Thank you for being here today." She eyed him from beak to tail qiuzzically. "Take care, will you? You should eat more. Remember to come for me if you need help in anything. I'm almost a grown up now, you know." She did a very good impression of a bird proudly puffing her feathers. "Stay safe. I love you, pretty bird." 

She took him into a gentle embrace again. He purred.

Maleficent decided she will have to throw up unless they both end that sickeningly sweet behavior.

Thankfully, Diaval took to the air, at long last, and Aurora yelled one last time: "And remember, no old carrion!" 

And the girl ran back to the cottage, stopping once to check that Diaval's present was secured in her apron pocket.

Diaval made the point of soaring in a wide radius for quite some time. Maleficent bitterly wondered if he was mocking at her for not being able to fly like him, although her heart was telling her she was just being envious and sorry for herself. She didn't move at all and didn't call him. He knew she was there, there was no question about that. If he wanted to come, he'd come. 

Finally, her patience paid off. He glided down in smaller and smaller circles, until he settled down, not on her staff or shoulder, bur on a branch twelwe feet away from her. 

Since he was quiet and still, she remained that way, too. She hoped his hearing wasn't sharp enough to hear her deafening heartbeat. They just stared at one another, equally stubborn.

_This is ridiculous. I am strong. I am his mistress, and I need not mind his opinion of me. I don't care if he serves me out of love or out of duty. Whatever happens now, happens. I will not care._

"That was the most cringeworthy  
display of bootlicking I have ever had the misfortune of witnessing", she spoke.

At that, he made a cliking noise and his hackles puffed up. 

When she was sure her hands showed no sign of trembling, she pulled them out of her cloak and flicked her fingers. 

The heaviness of her heart was starkly contrasted with a comical way he overbalanced from the branch as his shape changed and he fell face-first in the dry leaves on the ground. The fact that he flapped his hands uselessly right before he made contact with the earth didn't help the impression. Despite herself, she had to chuckle. 

When he sat upright and spat the dirt out and looked at her, his eyes were his own. Not the empty sockets of nothingness that chilled her the last time they spoke. Just his usual soft, intelligent focus, not quite human, not quite animal, but warm and soulful in any way imaginable.

The sheer amount of relief that flooded her over made her furious at herself.

"A splendid landing, if I may notice", she said. 

_Come on. Take the hint, you ridiculous bird. Make a quip. Say something. Jest me, if you must. Complain. Just..._

"A splendid sitting on your behind doing absolutely nothing for the child's birthday, if I may notice. I had to do everything by myself. Have you any idea how difficult it is to wrap a fistful of small items in a handkerchief using a beak and talons? Not to mention acquiring the silk. A laundress with uncannily quick moves almost ended my existence with a well-aimed soap bar. " 

"A tragedy avoided succesfully, I see." Maleficent decided to specifically not mention the fact he had been hindered with a beak and talons at his own request. He was probably grasping for straws now, too.

"King Stefan has apparently embarked on a plan to acquire all iron in existence", Diaval said. Her eyes pinned at him, alarmed at this unexpected change of topic. "Cartfuls have arrived to the castle these days. All the windows has been closed shut, and I couldn't get inside. I did not see him. The laundry women know nothing of his plans, but they say the forgers are been required to come from all around the kingdom." 

"Interesting", she drawled out coldly. She was morbidly glad to hear this. So, Stefan decided to make a move. "Delightful, really."

Diaval cocked his head to look at her sideways. He had dark circles under his eyes, and, like Aurora noticed immediately, was thinner than usual. She will have to force-feed him like a goose if he continues like this. 

"I think it's quite alarming", he replied. "Perhaps it would be wise for you to retreat deeper in the Moors. An iron shard the size of a pebble would be enough to off you, if aimed correctly. And the king appears to plan a hailstorm of iron upon you." 

"Well, thank you so much for reminding me of my limitations and weaknesses. You know how I love when you do that."

"Always aiming to please you, mistress."

"Perhaps he intends to build a refuge of iron for himself. We know not yet. I have no doubt you'll find out. That is why I have you. " she glared at him. "Do I not?"

The moment of silence made her lose the feeling in her legs. She was glad she was seated on the soft layer of leaves.

"As long as it is your wish", he replied. 

She wasn't entirely pleased with the anwser, although she should probably have been. "And what is it that you wish, Diaval?"

"For today, I just wish to be left in this shape."

She was surprised by the request, and even more with the swiftness it came. It was obviously premeditated. "Oh? How come, now?"

"I need my hands", he said, somewhat reluctantly, adverting his eyes. His knees were drawn up to his chin, and the said hands rested on them. When she continued to stare pointedly, he added: "I need to dig up a hole."

 _Oh. Oh, his poor heart_ , was her first thought, before she reminded herself that the Protector of the Moors did not dwell in such needles sentimentalities. Simultaneously, she found a part of herself to be glad that the mangy old vulture croaked, and she shuddered at that, deciding that perhaps, maybe only this time, needless sentimentalities might be preferable to the alternative.

Impressive that he would, in the midst of his mourning, come to spend this morning with the beastie and play with her to make her happy for her birthday. Maleficent wished for that kind of strenght. 

He was now facing away from her, but a subtle slump in his shoulders was enough to make her lose all interest in a quip fight. Finding herself at loss, unsure whether to simply walk away from him quietly or to sit next to him, or to say something...only what? Should she place a hand on his shoulder? What if he brushes her off? Should she give her condolences, or pretend she doesn't know anything? She was skillful in geat many things, but curses and damnation, this was _not_ one of them. He was supposed to always look after her. That was the natural order of things. 

She was obviously supposed to do something, because he showed no intention of moving or speaking. And she was the one who perhaps, maybe, did mess up a little bit the last time they talked. 

She stood up, not certain where her legs would take her. They carried her to his side, where she sat again next to him. He was still looking away from her and she couldn't see his eyes. 

"I am... _sorry_ ", she growled. It felt like couging up dirt. 

"Whatever for?" His voice was raspier then ever, and she knew she'd see tears in those eyes if she looked, and she didn't trust herself not to do something very cruel or stupid then. Especially since he was feigning ignorance now.

"For..." she made a vague gesture at herself, even if he wasn't looking. "...everything."

"That's oddly unspecific."

" _Diaval_."

"I know, mistress." Sometimes she wanted to slap that kindness out of him. "It's fine."

"It shouldn't be. You are too forgiving."

"Not at all. Maybe you are too petty."

"You are a single sentient creature that tells me that and walks away with a functioning mouth."

"The day is still long." He finally turned to look at her, leaning his head on his knees, and she was faced with those eyes that pulled at her heartstrings so mercilessly. Red-rimmed and very bright, but thankfully not overflowing with tears. "Really, mistress, let it go. Besides, what you did for her is more than enough of an apology. You need not say more."

 _What she did for her_...She sighed. Did nothing these days go according to her plans? "Ah. So, you know...that I know."

"Of course I know. I'd know your magic anywhere." He gave her a sad little attempt of a smile. "It gave her peace. She didn't suffer any..." 

He stopped mid-sentence and clenched his jaws. His eyes filled with tears so quickly that it took them both off guard. He made no attempt to wipe his eyes or hide, but other than tears that fell freely, he was perfectly still and quiet as a mouse. She watched with a feeling that the air was being punched out of her. His grief was so beautiful, composed, even gracious. When she was overcome with grief, it was destructive, loud and ugly. 

This was, she knew, the moment when one was supposed to embrace the bereaved person. Her hand gave a spasmic twitch halfway towards his back and fell back on the ground between them. It clenched into a fist there; then, a single finger straightened out, a pinkie, and with its talon she poked Diaval's hip and stayed there on the ground next to him.

He looked down, assumingly to swat away (and perahps to eat) a bug that was pestering him, and his face brightened up through the tears with that lopsided smile of his. His hand slid down from his knee and his own pinkie found hers, flesh barely touching, talons overlapping. 

A lot of Maleficent's anxiety dissipated like smoke in the air. They must have looked ridiculous like that, in such a childish display, but for once, she didn't mind. They were back, the two of them, and he will be all right. She could do this. This was good.

"Do you want my help?" She asked after a while, when her arm started growing numb, and Diaval showed no particular desire to move. 

"With what?"

"With...burying. Her. Burying your mate."

"My...mate?" 

He looked perplexed. Maybe a bit shocked. Maleficent frowned, confused at his confusion.

"Mistress," he spoke carefully, as if explaining to a very slow child, "she was my _mother_."

"Your...?" 

_Oh goodness. Oh goodness._ Once he recovers, he'll never let her hear the end of it. She was glad her ears were hidden under her headpiece, because she could feel those pointy tips burning scarlet.

But Diaval didn't seem inclined to mock her, at least not yet. 

"After my...initial transformation, Mother was...displeased", he explained. "She feared it. Resented it. Could not cope. And soon, she left for south and never came back." 

It was difficult not to feel guilty. There was no accusation in his voice, only the statement of truth, but Maleficent had tasted wormwood less bitter than this truth. And there he was, telling her he did not forgive too easily. 

"Don't go there", he warned her. "I know what you are thinking. Don't blame yourself. Remember, I would have been dead if not for you, and she would have lost her fledgling anyway. Even if I never got caught in that net, even if I never bound myself to you, I would be long dead now. I have always been a runt. I was the smallest of the clutch. I'm a runt still. Mistake me for a crow, many did. Still many do. There was not a single raven I could compete with for foraging grounds. Not a single one that would be my mate. Nobody expected me to live long, Mother included. I was destined to be her disappointment in any case. Having you in my life was the first worthwhile thing that happened to me since the day I hatched. Aurora was the next. So, no regrets there."

Maleficent was speechless again. If this was to become a habit, it would be the most troublesome one.

"I am not displeased to have you in my life, either" she said at last. For her trouble, she earned a chuckle from him.

"Ah, mistress, careful. All that enthusiasm. Hold your horses, as humans would say."

"I am not a kind person. I will never be a kind person, Diaval. You will never hear much praise from me. I am and I will always be cruel and petty, as you observed so brilliantly. I will never change. Still, I hope you know..." 

She trailed away.

"I know", he offered her a life line. Taking it, she nodded. 

"And I'm not asking you to change", he added. "You really need not to, for me of Aurora or the Moors. Only for yourself, if you ever wish to. Me, I think you are just fine the way you are."

Yes, the scarlet was definitely spreading from her eartips down the bridge of her cheekbones. "You should raise your expectations, you silly bird."

"Well, maybe a bit more shiny details..."

And there he was, attempting to joke when she knew he felt anything but.

"Why so I get the feeling that you are steering this conversation towards me and away from you?" She cut him off and poked him again with her pinky talon in his scrawny posterior, eliciting another chuckle. "Let it never be known that our entire alliance was always centered around me. This is about you. You were talking how your mother left for south."

"Oh. How considerate of you", he made a purposfully pouty face. "Yes, she migrated south and I haven't seen her again in all this time. I thought her dead. Until a some two months ago. She was back, just like that. But of course, a decade and a half older. And ill. Two weeks later, she was unable to fly. A month later..." he shrugged. 

"Do you know why was she back?"

"She wanted to die here", he said in a flat tone. 

"Was she more...accepting of your changed nature now?"

"Oh, she still despised it. So much that she downright refused any help from you when I offered to ask you, sorry to have to say that. Which is, by the way, why I thought it better to leave you out of it. But she was stuck with me. There was no one left alive who cared for her, nobody whom she could ask for help."

"Your brothers, sisters?...certainly you could not have been the only..."

"Mistress, it has been so many years", he said patiently. "All are dead now. And now, I am alone. I am the last one."

His whispered words rang horribly hollow and ominous. Overcome with the feeling of impending doom, her hand suddenly snapped open and covered his, gripping it in a hawk-like manner. His pinkie was sticking out of her grip awkwardly.

"No", she snarled out, threateningly. At whom, she couldn't say.

Diaval didn't appear to be surprised by her uncharacteristic display. In fact, he continued talking as if he haven't heard her or felt her. "Mother was stubborn. She loved life. Spiteful as hell. I guess that's why she outlived them all. She clang to life with beak and talon. Even when she suffered greatly, she fought for every breath. Alhough she complained to the last one."

 _Why am I not surprised,_ Maleficent thought, but stayed silent.

After a while, Diaval considerately noted with a shy smile: "I'm going to need two good wings, you know." 

She released the grip on his hand, slowly. Her fingers cramped. His own were purple. 

He leaned back on the tree, closing his eyes and letting out a deep breath he seemed to have been holding for months. His whole body relaxed.

"It's all over", he whispered to himself. "Goodness, I'm tired."

"Rest, then. I'll keep watch."

"I still have a hole to dig."

"You will. Later. Sleep now." 

"Some carrion eaters might get to her if she falls off that tree."

"At the risk of sounding insensitive, you never seem to have a problem with that when you are the one doing the carrion eating."

"Well, normally I woulndn't press it, but..." he squirmed uncomfortably. "...it's closer to the farms then I like...the dogs might get her. And I hate dogs." 

She gave an overdramatic sigh and extended her hand to him. He took it and she pulled him to his feet. "Well, let us not waste any time, then." 

"You are coming with me?" His face brightened. 

"Should I let you wander outside the Moors in your human shape? And risk that one of Stefan's men sees you, decides that a strange man in black making a grave for a bird is an unusual sight, suspects your connection with me and assaults you? I don't think so. Who could now bother finding anoher pair of wings? Look how long it took me to make a decent servant out of you. You finally went to spy on the king without being explicitly ordered."

"Actually, mistress, I just went to steal a silk handkerchief. It just so happened that the iron shipment was arriving."

"I do hate liars, you know."

"But you tolerate me."

 _Oh, that incorrigible bird_. 

"Let's pick her up and bury her in the Moors, if you have no objections, Diaval. You were right. I'm not that enthusiastic to go digging outside the wall in broad daylight, with Stefan's men on the move and piles of iron at his disposal."

  
Later, almost at nightfall, Maleficent watched as Diaval lowered his mother's small, disheveled body in a narrow, but deep grave. The foolish bird refused her help, stating that this is the last thing he does for his mother, and what Maleficent could have done effortlessly in a hearbeat turned into a prolonged toil on his part. He had been digging for hours, using only his fingers, and while having talon-like nails probably helped, they were finally paying the price. Several were broken, and all bled. Maleficent could do little except conjure a leafy roof above his head so he wouldn't get sunstroke, and provide water when they got thirsty. He refused food, and she didn't feel ravenous either, so neither of them ate. 

Thankfully, he was finally satisfied with his work. Personally, Maleficent would have left the grave a whole lot shallower. 

Still, when he picked that decrepit body up and gently layed her to her last resting place (though "final" was a bit questionable if an enthusiastic fox would come exploring. She will have to put some repellent magic on the cursed place), Maleficent felt a strange kind of sorrow. Perhaps because she had just spent half of the day staring at that corpse, and the sun and the lack of nourishment were getting to her, but...

She waited until Diaval was done covering the grave with dirt and stones, before she spoke.

"You know, I think she didn't come back because she wanted to die here. I think she came back because she wanted to spend time with you before she died."

Diaval looked at her incredulously. He was dirty and exhausted. "I think you have been on the sun for too long, mistress." 

"Her only living child. Of course she wanted to see what she had missed. And," she cleared her throat for this, " I don't believe for a second that she actually thought you to be a disappointment."

"She had a strange way of showing that."

"I have a strange way of showing great many things." 

"You are not my mother", he smiled, dirty hair and feathers falling into his face, making the dark circles under his reddened eyes more prominent.

"Thank goodness, no" she grinned. She produced golden threads of healing magic, and they settled on his bleeding fingers, healing them instantly. She didn't like his haggard appearance, and she made a mental note to be cautious of any signs of illness he might show in the days that come.

"Go get yourself clean. It's late. We'll sleep here; I don't feel like walking all the way home now. I'll make us a shelter. Also, you look horrible. Tomorrow I am monitoring your food intake. You will eat and I will watch. This is a direct order. I will allow no disobedience on the matter."

"Are you planning on fattening me up to eat me later, mistress? Certainly a goose would be more fitting for the task."

"I said no disobedience. That includes the attempts of a humor. It is no laughing matter. I need you healthy."

"No disobedience, mistress. In fact, I'll let you know that ravens feed one another quite often. In fact, a common occurence among mati..." 

"Don't. Say. That." She warned.

"It is not the only..."

"Enough." 

"Most kind of bonds are enforced by offering regurgi..."

"I will turn you into a moth without prior warning."

"Oh, you wouldn't. I could get eaten by an unsuspecting cousin of mine, and you would have to go through the trouble of finding a new servant."

"Hmph." She turned away to assess where to settle for the night, assuming he wouldn't want to sleep so close to his mother's grave, but when she turned back to ask him if he'd like to be a bird for the night, she found him to be sound asleep, lying on his back and snoring quietly. He'd probably thought just to stretch his legs a little, but the sleep tricked him.

He'll be mortified when he wakes up and realises he fell asleep dirty and ungroomed. She couldn't remember that ever happening before.

She requested aid from an oak three, whose leaves and branches shifted at her command and bowed down to the ground to make a big, nest-like structure there, which could fit comfortably a wingless fairy and a humanoid raven.   
With a wave of her hand, Diaval was set gently floating to the nest, and she stepped into it next, crouching down. Then, the branches lifted the nest up, and soon they were secured in the dense canopy.

Lying her head down on her palms, she watched the steady rise and fall of Diaval's scarred chest. It comforted her. Even the news of Stefan's ominous actions couldn't disturb the calmness that settled over her as she watched her companion at her side. Even the ever-present gnawing, biting, burning, constantly growing unease over Aurora's approaching doom seemed to retreat slightly now, here, with the night settling over them two together in a makeshift nest, their peculiar bond mended after being so dangerously damaged. She had the urge to reach out and tuck away the strands of dirty, sweaty hair that fell on his face, to place a kiss on his forehead, but she wouldn't risk being caught in the act of such gentleness for the life of her. So she settled to just watch him sleep, depositing that image and that feeling to her miserably meagre collection of Happy Memories After Stefan. All the old ones were banned, because in them she had her wings, and her heart had been pure, and remembering them was unbeareble, and she might as well not have them at all. She will probably be cursed by any deities in existence for taking the day of his grief as a _happy_ memory, but she was cursed beyond repair a long time ago anyway. She will take what she can.

In the morning, she will have him fed, first thing. 

And then she will inform him how dreadful his snoring had been, and how she barely had a minute of sleep.


End file.
